Immersive, virtual reality art experience inside Britain’s national Penitentiary 1816 to 1890. Project ongoing 2020. More - millbankprison.org/

My father, Dave Follows was a professional cartoonist, he drew for a living, so as a kid growing up I saw him draw everyday all day/night, he drew for comics, local and national/International newspapers. He drew a daily cartoon strip for a local paper in Stoke-on-Trent, The Sentinel, called ‘May Un Mar Lady’ written in Stoke-on-Trent Potteries dialect, which ran every day for over 30 years until he death in 2003.

Dave must have had an imagined world in his head where all the characters lived, the house where they lived, the neighbours, the street, the local pub, chippy & shops etc. The cartoons also have a cult following in Stoke-on-Trent, so theres likely a similar imagined world in the minds of the fans of the cartoon strip.

Using the cartoons as primary reference material, I have taken various snippets from the cartoons to montage and build up a picture of the cartoon world that my father might have imagined when coming up with his gags and sketch cartoons. For the DRAWN BEYOND exhibition I have used virtual reality to begin a long process of attempting to re-create my father's imagined cartoon world. I have started with the house where May Un Mar Lady lived, creating the rooms and furniture of the house, trying to keep as true to my dads pen and ink drawings as possible. Over time I hope to continue building the world, completing the house, and adding the neighbouring house, the street, the local pub, chippy & shops etc.

The virtual reality piece is fully interactive and visitors are free to walked around the virtual space, the space is also online on VR Chat where anyone can join me & others in the space either in 2D view from a desktop PC or in VR. Search user ChrisVRChat and room location #7282.